Seventeen-year-old Parker Frost has never taken the road less traveled. Valedictorian and quintessential good girl, she’s about to graduate high school without ever having kissed her crush or broken the rules. So when fate drops a clue in her lap—one that might be the key to unraveling a town mystery—she decides to take a chance.

Julianna Farnetti and Shane Cruz are remembered as the golden couple of Summit Lakes High—perfect in every way, meant to be together forever. But Julianna’s journal tells a different story—one of doubts about Shane and a forbidden romance with an older, artistic guy. These are the secrets that were swept away with her the night that Shane’s jeep plunged into an icy river, leaving behind a grieving town and no bodies to bury.

Reading Julianna’s journal gives Parker the courage to start to really live—and it also gives her reasons to question what really happened the night of the accident. Armed with clues from the past, Parker enlists the help of her best friend, Kat, and Trevor, her longtime crush, to track down some leads. The mystery ends up taking Parker places that she never could have imagined. And she soon finds that taking the road less traveled makes all the difference.

Golden is the first novel I've read by Jessi Kirby, but I own both Moonglass and In Honor. After absolutely loving this book, you can bet I'll be picking up the other two posthaste. They're both relatively short, so I don't know why I didn't get to them sooner.

Golden isn't long, by any means, but whatever it might lack in length, it makes up for by packing an emotional punch. Anyone who's ever wondered if they're following their own dreams or just attempting to meet the expectations of everyone around them will identify with Parker's character on some level. She's ambitious and goal-oriented, but she's also afraid that she's let life pass her by without taking any risks or doing anything memorable. After finding Julianna's journal, she's even more certain that if she were to look back on her life ten years from now, she'll have nothing to show for it: no great love, no crazy stories, nothing besides a lot of hard work.

So, when the opportunity for something bigger than her or her own problems presents itself, Parker makes it her mission to solve the mystery of the town's most famous couple's disappearance. And instead of offering up platitudes and promises of things to come, Parker's best friend Kat insists they go out big, that they discover what really happened that fateful night ten years ago. I've noticed that most of the time, friends named Kat in stories or in real life -- my older sister is named Kat -- are often the ones with the harebrained schemes that end up being pretty epic. I kind of adored this friendship in the book. Parker was a bit frustrating at times, especially when it came to Trevor, but that's where Kat would swoop in and smooth things over for me.

The story pays homage to Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken", though a great emphasis is placed on all of his works, since Parker's father is a poet and her family might potentially be descended from Frost. I loved how the themes of chance and choice were interwoven into the story and how they eventually played out in both Parker and Julianna's lives. Golden was actually a story within a story, which made the mystery that much more compelling and made the book that much harder to put down without finishing every last word. From what I've heard, her other books are no less compelling, and I can't wait to find out for myself.

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About the author:

Jessi Kirby is the author of Golden, which will be released in May of 2013, Moonglass, and In Honor. She is also a former English teacher and librarian, wife, mom, beach lover, runner, and lover of Contemporary YA, strong coffee, and dark chocolate. In that order.

I do love stories within a story! And, after reading this review, I am compelled to read Golden. I need a good old emotional contemporary once in a while :) I also love epic mysteries. Awesome review, thanks!

I'm a little nervous about the dual storyline aspect of this book, BUT every single thing I've heard about this book makes me think I'm going to love it to pieces, so I'm hoping that I can get into that too. I remember memorizing The Road Not Taken in high school, and I'm also excited about the poetry themes.

I didn't even realize that duality existed until I got into the story, but it didn't bother me and it wasn't hard to follow. I actually think it made it a more engaging read, to see how Parker drew parallels between her own life and that of Julianna's. Simply put, it was beautiful.